Saint of the Day: Bl. Marie-Élisabeth Turgeon

Religious Sister and Educator (1840-1881)

Her life

+ Élisabeth was born in Beaumont, Quebec, Canada, and was a pious child. Following her graduation from Quebec’s Laval Normal School in 1862, she worked as a teacher in several village schools.

+ In 1875, at the invitation of the bishop of Rimouski, she joined the Sisters of the Little Schools and professed religious vows in 1879. She was known in religious life as Marie-Élisabeth.

+ Marie-Élisabeth formed a new religious community known as the Sisters of Our Lady of the Rosary. She wrote textbooks for her sisters to use in their classes and, today, the sisters are also involved in adult education and serve in a number locations, including Newfoundland, Honduras, Peru, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Lebanon.

+ Blessed Marie-Élisabeth Turgeon died in 1881, at the age of forty-one, and was beatified in 2015.

For prayer and reflection

“With Christ’s protection, a spider web can be stronger than a brick wall without his protection, a brick wall can be as flimsy as a spider’s web.”—Blessed Marie-Élisabeth Turgeon

Spiritual bonus

On this day we also remember Saint Beatrice da Silva Meneses. Born into a noble Portuguese family, she eventually became a Cistercian nun in Toledo, Spain. Around 1484, inspired by a vision of the Mother of God, she established a new religious community: the Congregation of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (the Conceptionists). Saint Beatrice died in 1492, and was canonized in 1976; she is honored as a patron saint of prisoners.

Prayer

O God, who raised up blessed Marie-Élisabeth in your Church to show others the way of salvation, grant us, by his (her) example, so to follow Christ the master, that we may come with our neighbor into your presence. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

(from The Roman Missal­: Common of Holy Men and Women—For an Educator)

Saint profiles prepared by Brother Silas Henderson, S.D.S.